Global Teacher - WEB 2.0 Community and Research Project

Lesson Plan for Tue 8th April, 2008

Topic: Oceana - Australia - our culture, country, school, town, farm

Length of lesson - 60 minutes

Class size: 110 students, several staff members!

Time of lesson: New Brunswick 8:45am, Australia 9:45pm

Teachers involved: Jeff Whipple, Chad Ball and other interested Canadian staff; and me, Anne Mirtschin (Australia)

Venue:

• Nashwaaksis Middle School / Devon Middle School School District 18 Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada and
• the study, my home, Hawkesdale, Australia

Prior learning:

• existing wiki, with resources set up by Chad Ball, the teacher in New Brunswick
• questions posed by the students in reply to the message by Chad, posted on the facebook bulletin board.If any of you have a good question for our Australian webguest, please post it here. Add your name, write your question down and bring it tomorrow morning. You may have the chance to ask. See the questions.

Resources:

• skype, headphones with microphone,
•  lots of digital images of Australia put into 4 powerpoint presentations
• wiki setup with MS Powerpoint presentations, using slideshare to embed them into the wiki.
• internet access
• nerves of steel!!

Lesson Plan:

Introduction: introduce myself and my country with a map of Australia.

Lesson: Walk through the slideshares on the wiki, indicating ‘next’ so Chad and his students can be viewing the same slide as me, as I talk to these students about our culture, country, town, school and farm, stopping for questions along the way.

Conclusion: Question time for staff and students.

Evaluation:

Self:  There were many questions which is always a good indication. My voice broke up somewhat but overall skype and the line were okay. We dropped out once but were soon back online again. Such a powerful learning experience that textbooks can never give.

Jeff: kids loved it…isn’t skype wonderful kids couldn’t stop gabbing about presentation all day…so excited…you are so right about textbooks…primary sources  are as close as our connections to the world…current, authentic.  thanks sooo soooo much…the kids haven’t stopped talking about you, the learning, and your “funny” accent…

Chad: As it was still pretty early when we came online, the students were all pretty sleepy, but that didn’t stop them from talking about you all day! I would really like to see this communication continue, if you are interested.  How many students have you got?  Maybe we could do some type of e-penpal idea or something of that nature.  I would love to have the kids share some of their teenage lives with each other.

Part of our ‘de-brief’ when we were done was to review some of the pics and video from your website.  I also had the kids write a few quick notes to you.

• It was incredible,
  Its just so different from what is normal here. I probably would of never found any of that out if it wasn’t for that presentation!
• That was soo cool! it was real awesome of the cool things i (and everyone) learned, I think i’m gonna do some research on more later…
• i really liked the fact that we were actually talking to her. not just in email. i thought all the pictures she showed were pretty sweet. also, i thought it was cool how we are used to different surroundings and habbits.. yes, we dont say put your bookbag in the boot… i still find it awsome, though. i love australia so much! (not to mention thier accents!)
• I thought that was so cool, for anyone who missed that, I wish that they could have seen it!
• that was an EXCELENT, presentation. I LOVED IT.
  it was very interesting, and i think that getting to learn chinese
  is a very diffrent thing then what we learn here.
  THANK-YOU SO MUCH. :
• i dont really understand why they learn chinese… i dont really think that makes much sense
• Hi Mrs. Mirtshin
  We were just watching you video and we wanted to know what bubble taps were.
• I really enjoyed seeing and listening to her.
  I learned a lot of new things
• i loved her accent. when she said RIGHT-O ! hahaha !
• Hello again..
  I jsut wanted to say thanks again for taking the time to talk to us abotu Australia. It was really interesting and i learned a lot!.
• it was swet
  her accent was cool, but the conection kept breaking up
  but it was till sweet
• thanks allot for sharing some of the intersting facts about were your from and for taking the time out of your day!!
• I thought that it was great! And I love her accent. Plus, we got out of Math!!! It was really fun and I hope we can do it again.
• Mrs.Mirtschin,
  Thank you very much for taking your time to teach us about where you live. I thought i was really interesting to learn about how different it is from here.
  thanks again !!
• Awesome presentation and pics. I’m gonna look up some more stuff on Australia… We should have a field trip there lol it would be fun…
• Yeah we thoguht the presentation was cool, and the web-cam thing was a really good idea. We both learned lot’s of new things about Austrailia.
• thank you Mrs. Mirtschin, that was really cool… and i hope that someday i will come to australia, and now that i know a little bit about australia i will be able to understand things there even more.
  for anyone who missed it, it was a very awsome presentation.
  you should have been there.
• Thank you for teachiing me lots of things that i didnt know about Australia.
  P.S. I LOVE YOUR ACCENT!
• Thank-you for teaching us stuff… PS. Kangaroos are cute!
• Thank you for teaching me so much about your home, Australia. I learned a lot of really cool stuff, and I hope that some day I can go there to explore for myself.
• jsut wanted to say thanks for talking with us today and taking the time to teach us more about australia. hope you have a grate day MATE, or nignt i dont know
• I that it was to cool that we got to talk to you this morning
  Thank you lots
• hey mrs. mirtschin
  thanks for teaching us about australia it was fun thanks again
• Thank you Mrs. Mirtschin for teaching us alot about Australia and what it is like to go to school there and about the farms and the sheep and everything. I enjoyed listening to you talk and asking you questions thank you for your knowledge that you shared with us.
• thank you i learned stuff that i dident know about befor
• i really liked the presentation you gave!!! thanks bunches
• good stuff, cool last name
• That was really interesting! It was pretty wicked awesome in my words. -lh
• i thought that was a really interesting presentation. i can’t believe you can EAT kangaroo! gross.— emma.
  P.S- her accent is AWESOME.
• Lucas: thanks for doing your awesome presentation! ps: i would like to try kangaroo
  Stephen: thank you for taking your time to do that it was great!
• Thank you very much for your time. I really enjoyed listening to your presentation. I thought it was very interesting and very well done !
• Thank you so much for staying up late to talk to us. I thougth it was really fun and nice of you. Hopefuly we can do it again sometime!
• Thank-you so much for staying up late and talking to us about Australia.! I learnt a lot just from that presentation. : ) . It made me want to take a trip to Australia! That would be pretty sweet .! Anyway, THANKS SO MUCHH! : )
• Thank you for the grate moring here.
  Thank you for geting ous out of the frst 2 class of the day!
• Thank you!
  I learned a bit from the presentation this mornig!
  I wish I could visit Australia sometime!

Dont forget to check out Jeff’s version of our flatclassroom.

 ”A comment a day encourages bloggers to have their say.” (A quote from one of my twitter friends.)

 When using online tools, the power of leaving comments when viewing other people’s work should not be overlooked. Comments can be made on blogs, podcasts at http://www.podomatic.com/, teacher tube etc and even be added to some vokis and voicethreads.

I can still remember the excitement, when our classroom blog received its first comment. Someone was actually reading our post on the http://www.backyard.globalstudent.org.au/ It read:-

Your “backyard” is beautiful! Thank you for sharing it with the world. (Lori, California)

…and the comment was  from overseas!! How absolutely fabulous!! That was it, the posts went up regularly - all students wanted comments, so they knew they had to complete the work, write interestingly and well, add images, if possible, for added impact and there was a need to proofread.

Here are more reasons on why comment!! (taken primarily from an educational angle)

• There is an authentic audience that is now tangible. Another memory from early this year, was hearing a simultaneous whoop of delight from my year 9/10 IT elective students when they discovered people were commenting on their posts. Now, that is a sound, we rarely hear in our traditional classrooms!!
• Comments can be so highly motivating. There is an authentic audience and real people are reading (it is not just for an assessing classroom teacher).
• They can lead to conversations. Students from the USA made comments on older student blogs asking for feedback on what USA was mentioned. That made my students sit down and think!!
• Connections are made by replying to the email address that must be shown when commenting.
• Establishes social networks The most experienced bloggers  maintain good social networks as they email replies to all comments and conversations extending the post to even greater depth and levels.
• Teaches students and adults cybersafety techniques. Comments on most blogs require approval before they are published online, so students are taught responsibility for diagnosing and filtering appropriate material.
• It may activate student-led learning. Comments on some student posts have aroused the curiousity of students - the location of the person making the comment, the need to research further a comment on Mt Helen’s volcanic eruption, a question that requires higher order thinking skills etc
• An increase in personal confidence. People care about the writer and the content of the post. Further dots are appearing on their clustr maps etc. Students want to share their work and here is proof that they are - whether it be another teacher, parent friend or global visitor.
• Encourages regular posts - which helps increase reading and writing skills
• May drive the blogger to read the commentator’s blogs and learn about other cultures, ideals, thoughts, geographical areas and learning activities taking place in other schools around the globe.

Next time, you read a post, even if it is just a short one liner, please make a comment and it will make a big difference to the writer- whether they be experienced or inexperienced.

As we are pioneers in cyberspace, cybersafety is a concern that is being refined and evaluated all the time - trying to balance transparency with privacy, allowing students some freedom, yet protecting them and ensuring their safety at all times.

Students complete posts in classtime but many find it so enjoyable, they post at home keeping a running journal, adding multimedia and producing online digital portfolios.

Here is what we have done in our classrooms this year, in relation to cybersafety:-

• Watched videos on cybersafety, consulted various online sites (see suggestions) and hold ongoing classroom discussions.
•  Constantly reinforce the need for safety during class eg no surnames, no addresses/phone numbers and other personal details to be placed online.
•  Students create their own avatar using MS Paint or use other avatar creating websites  This becomes their personal “photographic ID” for blogging purposes, voicethreads and other online sites. (See the image of a global voicethread below for some of the grade 3/4 avatars.)

• Parents sign permission forms agreeing to publish student work online , online photographs, on the condition that no names are attached and group photos to be used where possible.
• A folder and checked lists are kept to enable us to ensure these conditions are adhered to.
• A partnership with parents is essential, so an information evening with grades 4-6 parents was held early on in the year, outlining the pedagogy for the use of blogs and other web2.0 tools and outlining cybersafety issues. A “techno corner” article appears weekly in our school and community newsletter.
• Parents are encouraged to ‘adopt’ a student who may not have the internet at home. This ensures all students may get comments even those whose parents do not have internet access. Again, there are many watchful ‘eyes’ (both parents, staff and community) on our students, to alert us to any impending problems or issues.
• We have a great staff and many of them voluntarily read student posts and comment on them, including our principal. So students are aware that they are constantly being monitored.
• I have joint administration rights with my students on their blogs, so comments and posts can be edited if need be and comments and incoming links moderated.
• Jess McCulloch, our LOTE teacher, a techno savvy person and I are currently applying RSS feeds for each student’s blog to our google readers, so that we are alerted to any new posts that students put up.

Here are some further activities we will do:

Further parent info evenings or invite parents to  classes so they can see what their children are doing.
Add links on our blog sites outlining cybersafety protocol.
Produce a form for Students to sign in the presence of their parents alerting both parites to correct internet protocol.

Further interesting reading and links:-

10 digital rules

 Postcript: It is only when you hear of Al Upton and the possible consequences that it makes you even more aware of trying to keep our students safe and that wonderful tool of blogging intact and ongoing. However, we can never guarantee they will remain 100% safe, but maybe we can give them the skills to cope with the dangers and surprises that may lurk out there

I would alos like to add this comment from John Pearce a fellow Victorian teacher, who has been a real pioneer with younger students and blogging.

Hi Anne,

“Nice list and ideas. Another suggestion we have used is to include a page with a set of rules to all of the student based blogs we set up eg http://leaemibps.globalstudent.org.au/ There is a copy of the rules in Word format at http://johnp.wordpress.com/tutorials/

On a slightly related tack we also asked our students to consider the issue of copyright by directing them to http://mrpbps.globalstudent.org.au/copyright-4-kids/ and then write a page on their blogs in response. Despite most students composing some reasonable responses to the task, many still were fast and loose with images. :(.”

The majority of our students have set up their own blog space. A little risque as some of you might ask. After all some are only in years 4,5 and 6 and the even riskier end is year 9 and 10 teenagers. Well, so far so good.

Some have tried to put images on posts, to give their stamp of personality but this has led me to talk to them about public perception, cultural impact and plagarism. Most students have immediately complied and removed possible offensive material.

Cyber safety is constantly being addressed and talked about. Most have created their own avatars and are in the process of adding them to their blogs and their comments.

Much of the time it is student directed learning as they work out what they might need and the image they wish to project. eg Many started creating a personalized header image, using the panoramic option in irfanview.

Some have added posts for Chinese (mandarin Chinese is our LOTE). The principal and various members of staff have commented on the posts, and comments from overseas are starting to come in. (A clustr map widget exists in edublogs now.)

A meeting was held with grades 4-6 parents and part of that time was spent outlining our goals with student use of web2.0, including blogging. (See the slideshare below for the content). One parent commented from the floor that her 11 year old boy no longer wanted to play game……the staff who were present held their breath for the next comment……(as there had been rumblings as to the need for any technology at their age)……. but the next comment delighted us all…………..he only wants to blog now!!!!
Some are using it as journal entries about their daily acitivites with others adding any school work that they are proud of producing.Below is the presentation given to parents, using pedagogy to justify the use of web2.0 and predominantly blogging.

Blogging is such powerful learning material and students should blog.

Why?………………………Here are just 20 reasons 

This post has been written as a draft for a few days, but I wish to publish it now, in support of @alupton and his wonderful minilegends. (They have been asked to remove their blog by their education department)

1. It is FUN! Fun!….. I hear your sceptical exclamation!! However, it is wonderful when students think they are having so much fun, they forget that they are actually learning. One of my favourite blog comments is as follows: It’s great when kids get so caught up in things they forget they’re even learning…   by jodhiay                                                           
2. authentic audience - no longer working for a teacherwho  checks and evalutes work but  a potential global audience.
3. Suits all learning styles - special ed (this student attends special school 3days per weeek, our school 2 days per week, gifted ed, visual students, multi-literacies plus ‘normal‘ students.
4. Increased motivation for writing - all students are happy to write and complete aspects of the post topic. Many will add to it in their own time.
5. Increased motivation for reading - my students will happily spend a lot of time browsing through fellow student posts and their global counterparts. Many have linked their friends onto their blogroll for quick access. Many make comments, albeit often in their own sms language.
6. Improved confidence levels - a lot of this comes through comments and global dots on their cluster maps. Students can share their strengths and upload areas of interest or units of work eg personal digital photography, their pets, hobbies etc Staff are given an often rare insight into what some students are good at. We find talents that were otherwise unknown and it allows us to work on those strengths. It allows staff to often gain insight to how students are feeling and thinking.
7. Pride in their work - My experience is that students want their blogs to look good in both terms of presentation and content. (Sample of a year 10 boy’s work)
8. Blogs allow text, multimedia, widgets, audio and images - all items that digital natives want to use
9. Increased proofreading and validation skills
10. Improved awareness of possible dangers that may confront them in the real world, whilst in a sheltered classroom environment
11. Ability to share - part of the conceptual revolution that we are entering. They can share with each other, staff, their parents, the community, and the globe.
12. Mutual learning between students and staff and students.
13. Parents with internet access can view their child’s work and writings - an important element in the parent partnership with the classroom. Grandparents from England have made comments on student posts. Parents have ‘adopted’ students who do not have internet access and ensured they have comments.
14. Blogs may be used for digital portfolios and all the benefits this entails
15. Work is permanently stored, easily accessed and valuable comparisons can be made over time for assessment and evaluation purposes
16. Students are digital natives - blogging is a natural element of this.
17. Gives students a chance  to show responsibility and trustworthiness and engenders independence.
18. Prepares students for digital citizenship as they learn cybersafety and netiquette
19. Fosters peer to peer mentoring. Students are happy to share, learn from and teach their peers (and this, often not their usual social groups)
20. Allows student led professional development and one more……
21. Students set the topics for posts - leads to deeper thinking activities

This is surely powerful learning!!

As part of the Voices of the World project run by Sharon Tonner in Scotland, we have to complete a different task every month that focuses on using the kids voices. This month I got Grade 2/3 to lend me their voices to say numbers in English and Chinese. Here is the result:

I got all the kids to write a number and decorate it. I then took photos of their fabulous artwork. While they were working, I took my iPod with it’s voice recorder attached around the room and got each student to say a number in English or Chinese. I put it all together in Photostory 3, which is a free download from the internet. I had to adjust the timing of the images so that it matched up with the audio which took a bit of fiddling, but that was all.

To see numbers presentations from other classes around the world, go to the Voices of the World wiki and click on February’s Task.

While working with all this technology, I realised that some technology becomes obsolete. Sometimes very quickly.

I introduced the idea of an art project using and recycling materials using ‘old’ technology to the year 9/10 studio art class.

While brainstorming ideas for the large scale outdoors project one of the students mentioned their love of children’s books and their favorite: The Rainbow Fish. The students decided that this would be a good theme to draw together, and interest both primary and secondary students within the school. My brain began to race, how can I fit this in within the recycling materials boundary I had set, and make an attractive large scale artwork for the benefit of the school? What can we possibly use to create the look of the original illustrations and remain true to the originality of the student’s artwork as well? Then it dawned on me! Compact Disks! They would make lovely rainbow fish-scales and use up a load of obsolete, not working cd’s in the school and as it turned out in the wider community.
We are still working on the fish but we will soon have a whole ’school’ of them swimming up high on a wall to brighten up an otherwise dull space. Watch this space to see the progress.

(above) Stage one and two of one of the fish.

Another of the ’school’ nearing completion, we are discovering that the tails need to be reinforced somehow, so they won’t weaken and possibly fall off. Serious problem solving is required combined with working alongside the students in systems technology. In the top left hand of the above image it is possible to see the fishes eye being worked on before it is attached permanently.

Just a few more details now and this little fish will be finished. Isn’t she cute?

The group that made this fish decided to emphasise the eyes by creating eyelashes

and a eyelid. They trialled various media and methods before settling on this version.

Bright pink fishlips add to the effect. A few more detail to be added and the fish face will be complete

D Regan
Hawkesdale P -12

I was amazed (but thought it was great) to read Lori’s article on the top LHS of http://www.dailywriting.net/Wild%20Gardeners%20eLearning/Advent2007_Day1_WildGarden.html and to see that although Lori had been using web 2.0 for18 months it was only recently she realised that is the name given to her e-uses. I had assumed she had been there for yonks and that I would never, ever get to the stage she was at.

At the end of last year, I heard the word web 2.0 but due to the crazy time it is when school finishes, I put it to the back of my mind. After all, I had to cope with MS Access and Dreamweaver - the software types for the new year 12 ITA course. However, in May, an email came to me from our Moyne Cluster co-ordinator to ask whether we were into web 2.0 yet as web 3.0 would soon be here. At that stage I did not even know if I knew about web 1.0. However, I attended the ICTEV conference in May and decided to join up for all the possible sessions that even vaguely mentioned the word ‘web 2.0′.

Absolutely fascinated with what I heard, saw and witnessed, I was then ‘hooked’ and determined to learn more. At the same time a rich picture case studies grant was being offered by the Victorian Education Department. I decided to apply and to my surprise was a successful applicant. This grant allowed us to work on developing enhanced podcasts with grade 6, using as much web 2.0 along the way.

So, I immediately set up a del.icio.us account and soon got my students to do so as well. I have so many favourite websites that were bookmarked on my computer at home but this allowed my to bookmark them online. Not only that, but I could search for some great other web 2.0 sites, network with others who have similar interests and also share their sites and these are available to me anywhere there is the internet. I shall write more about this fabulous site but it gave me some insights into web 2.0 and how it could be used. It was easy to set up and easy to use. Further down the track Heather Blakey came to our school with her storyteller and Magic Garden and that set us off on blogging. I am not a writer, nor an artist but I love learning and encouraging others to learn so I have used blogging extensively now and google fed into other people’s blogs who are as mad on web 2.0 as I am. Our backyard blog is the result of Heather’s great work.

So, 6 months later, after a lot of hard work, wanting to have everything perfect all at once, including content and presentation, but still not even anywhere near that stage, I feel I have learnt so much, been re-energized, made a lot of global friends , many of whom I only know by their cyber names, and still wanting to learn much more. This is why I think the adventure calendar is so great ……………. and of course I have bookmarked that in delicious!

Anne Mirtschin

I teach in a relatively small p12 school at Hawkesdale. This small rural town is 30 minutes drive to the nearest large shopping centre of Warrnambool, so at times we work very independently and to a certain degree, in isolation as it is expensive now to drive to Melbourne (3 hours away) for PD activities and meetings that so many of our city peers take for granted.

However, blogging has opened up a whole new world for us. Our students have talked about their backyards, eagerly gone home and taken digital images or else scanned them and converted them to jpg files. Their blogs have been published. Kind people have actually made comments on their blogs which means that students have a real and authentic audience. These young digital natives are then encouraged to write and express themselves and explore further some of the comments made.

So, it is with a bit of fun that we have added a widget to our sites from clustrmaps. Once a user name and password is registered, together with an email address, a code is issued that is unique to that url or blogsite that you wish to use the world map on. So, once your email is activated, you goto clustrmaps again, obtain the code and paste it into one of your text widgets. Each time someone hits your blog site a red flag comes up in the reader’s country of origin. Our students love that because they can see that people in an increasing number of countries are actually looking at our backyard site.

Another fun widget might be a clock. An updated clock of your own choice at http://www.clocklink.com/ will keep your time and allow international guests know what the time is in your country. A code is again copied and pasted into another text widget and hey presto, you have a clock. I have only just got to experiment with widgets and will continue to do so. They are fun and add extra information or pizzaz to your site.

Anne Mirtschin

If you have downloaded the freeware Irfanview, a wonderful header for a blog or an online page can be created by stitching photos together to create a panoramic image. So, if you are in irfanview, ensure that all your digial photos are the same height and preferably same width. (Nb ensure that they are jpg and not bmp. Rename them through irfanview when you save as. I found the size 380 x 285 is good for a start) Goto image>create panorama>add image and continue adding as many images as you desire to form the header. Goto Tutorial sheet link at http://ejourneys.wikispaces.com/using+images for instructions on using irfan view. This is then saved as a jpg image and can be resized to the correct wordpress size by going to irfanview image>resize/resample and keying in the correct height (try 770 x 223).

Note that text can also be added easily to the image. Goto edit>insert text into selection>key it in and choose colours etc.